Why do bad things happen to good people?

I’d like to start by saying that the above question is only born from our myopic view of life. That is because there is nobody who is absolutely good or absolutely bad. I use the words “good” and “bad” for easy understanding but truth be told, those terms are only relative — they mean nothing in actuality. Let’s go the example way.

A man who is very nice to everyone at his church and office but beats his wife will receive the rewards of being nice and will also one day receive the rewards of being a wife beater. So let’s say nobody on the outside knows that he’s a wife beater and he’s getting promoted at work (because he’s such a saint) and one day we hear his wife died, we may find ourselves asking “how could such a nice man experience that?” Again it is because of our myopic view; we didn’t know everything.

Life is balanced and we, in one way or another, deserve everything we get; be it pleasant or not. If we are conscious of our thoughts and actions, then we will more easily see how we played into the things we are experiencing.

Because if this myopic view, we tend to see life as unfair. A person who exercises everyday gets cancer and we feel something is off…well it is because something is off. Let us dwell on this scenario. If a person is plagued by fear of sickness and that fear drives them to the gym, then it’s easy to see how they can’t outrun their fear. Such a person could run in the morning and then douse their senses with junk food or alcohol or just plain-old debilitating thoughts of sickness for the rest of the day. We don’t know everything.

I know alcohol consumers who drink more water than non-alcohol consumers. What do you think the long term results of that is going to be?

We have to be honest enough to know that we probably will never know all sides to any story but if we are wise enough, we will see that results don’t lie. Results are a 'result' of what we have been thinking and feeling and they will manifest in the open.

Another point to note is that every experience is a teacher so it is really unwise to mock a person who is experiencing a tough time. Yes it was probably caused by their indiscretions at some time but everyone can learn from their experiences and be better. That is why I used the term 'relative' earlier…good and bad depend on perspective.

I don’t intend to drag this out. What I’m stressing on is that what happens to/for us is what we deserve and there is always a balance to it, even if we can’t see it because of our myopic view of things. The way forward then is to take responsibility and trust the process. As we do that, this whole thing begins to make sense.

Until next time… ✌🏽